Hellfire
by The Daniel Jackson-2001
Summary: It is 1983, and the history of the world changes dramatically, as a result of a time meddler's desire to interfere and the possession of devastating bombs.
1. Prologue

Following the German defeat in 1945, Europe was divided between two new superpowers and their ideologies. The East was dominated by the Soviet Union, while the West was dominated by the United States. Both sides were determined to undermine and destroy the other at all costs. Their citizens gripped with fear and distrust. The nuclear age had begun, and a new weapon, far dangerous than any other weapon ever conceived, was built.

* * *

Captain Jack Harkness was not only unique, but he was also impossible. In the year 200,100, he died fighting the remnants of the Dalek Empire, which was thought to have been destroyed in the aftermath of the Last Great Time War. However, a friend of his brought him back to the world of the living. Before Jack could ask what had happened, his friends had left him behind. Using his own personal time machine, Jack traveled back in time to the Victorian era, although his intention was the modern age.

On Staten Island towards the end of the 19th century, he got into a fight and was stabbed to death. But he once again, came back to life. He fell from high places, fought in both the First and Second World Wars, and was attacked numerous times, and yet in all circumstances, he came back. Jack considered himself to be an impossible force of nature. He called himself the man who could never die.

* * *

John Benton had an extraordinary military career. It all started in 1968 when he was at the foundation of the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce (which would later be renamed Unified Intelligence Taskforce), or UNIT for short. He fought the Cybermen under the command of Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, who was then promoted from a Colonel to a Brigadier.

Benton would remain a member of UNIT during the early seventies and would combat the Autons and the power-hungry Time Lord known as the Master. He worked alongside another Time Lord known as the Doctor. He was among many who admired the Doctor. When the Doctor had chosen to depart UNIT, the Brigadier had chosen to retire, and Benton had been promoted once more. By 1980, he was promoted from the rank of Sergent to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He left UNIT but remained in the British Army.

Benton was the commanding officer in the Yorkshire nuclear missile base. Despite his military service, Benton disliked nuclear weapons, considering them to be barbaric creations. He would have rather been in command in Hong Kong or Northern Ireland. On the night of the twenty-sixth day of September 1983, Benton would face the most traumatic event of his career and worsen his hatred for his nuclear weapons.

* * *

The Doctor, Steven, and Vicki were making their way back to the Northumbrian coastline from the old Catholic monastery after sabotaging the Monk's TARDIS. They eventually reached the cliffs and looked down toward the beach. The Doctor hoped to reach the TARDIS and leave before the Norwegians could make a landing along the coast. While he wished that Barbara was still with them, he did remember that the Norwegians under King Harald Hardrada would invade England and attempt to take the English throne. Harald, unsurprisingly, would fail and England would once again be invaded but this time successfully by Duke William of Normandy.

Vicki and Steven on the other feared that TARDIS was swept up by the tide. Even when the Doctor reassured them that the tide would not affect the TARDIS and that the ship would still be there, the two young time travelers had thought that the Doctor was denying the truth. When they reached the coastline, the Doctor's two young companions would feel relieved, particularly Vicki.

"There it is, my dear," cried the Doctor excitingly, "there's the TARDIS. Safe and sound. Didn't I tell you so?"

"Oh, am I glad to see that old police box again," said Vicki with a sense of both pleasant surprise and relief.

"Oh, glad indeed," the Doctor continued, "well, we must start climbing down the cliff and get aboard as soon as we can. There's going to be an invasion shortly."

"What? You mean any minute now the Viking fleet's going to sail past here," Steven asked.

The Doctor turned toward Steven with a smile on his face. "Yes, my boy, yes. And history will be..." Vicki joined in and the two would finish the statement in unison: "... allowed to take its natural course." Steven laughed when they finished and he began to accept his new life with glee.

"You know," he said, "I'm beginning to like the idea of being a crew member on a time machine."

"A crew member? You'll be lucky. He's the crew. We're just the passengers," Vicki remarked.

"Yes, and both very welcome ones, my dear," said the Doctor, "come along, come along. Come on, come on."

The Doctor and Vicki began the trek down the cliffs while Steven looked down upon the beach. He remarked that he wished that they had a pair of wings as a result of the way down. Because of the Doctor's hatred for climbing, the trio walked down a steep but steady pathway, which made Vicki feel more comfortable, as her fear of heights made her despise climbing. By the time they reached the TARDIS, the sun was beginning to set behind the English countryside and the three of them were exhausted.

The TARDIS dematerialized away from the realm of Anglo-Saxon England and once again into the great unknown. The Doctor and Vicki wondered where the ship would take them next, while Steven began to remember one of the so-called 'technical hitches' that Vicki had told him about. The adventure had just begun.

* * *

The Monk had to squeeze inside the now tiny interior of his TARDIS. He struggles to command his ship as it traveled through the time vortex. But he had one goal in mind, he had always wanted to visit Russia. It was a dreadful place in his opinion, but he felt he could extend his influence.

He landed in the summer of 1983. He was fascinated by the Cold War between the Communist Eastern Hemisphere and the Capitalist Western Hemisphere. He found nuclear weapons to be a terrifying force of power and even evil, and he felt that he could bring peace. He had a plan. He could use his so-called _magnet-o-nater_ (he name that he found to be ridiculous) and force the missiles into space.

But first, he would have to convince both sides to fire upon each other like two wild beasts hunting each other for food and power. He chose to land at the Serpukhov-15 bunker located outside Moscow. And he hoped to upload a computer virus into the bunker's computers which would show an American attack. He then planned on traveling to Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado to do the same with that base's computers.


	2. Hopeless at the End of the World

Lieutenant Colonel Benton received a call from London, alerting him of the barrage of Soviet missiles flying over the Northern Hemisphere. He rushed to the control room of the base and was horrified by what he saw on the computers, Soviet missiles flying straight for Great Britain and the rest of the Western Hemisphere.

"What are we going to do, Sir," a young officer asked anxiously.

"Lieutenant Colonel," cried another officer, "we received orders to launch a retaliatory strike."

Benton's subordinates were crying out left and right, fearful for the future and anxious over what to do. Benton himself had hoped to avoid these present events. Now what seemed like the end of the world was unfolding in front of him, and he himself had the decision to fire missiles toward Russia, and henceforth many innocent people would die as a result of his orders. But Benton remembered that it was the Russians that fired first, who would be responsible for the death of many of his countrymen. And he had orders from Her Majesty's government that he must follow.

"Fire at will," he said.

John Benton took a sip of water in a futile attempt to calm himself down, and was left afraid and unsure. He was forced to watch the apocalypse. He was forced to witness the deaths of millions, including his family and friends.


	3. Here comes Captain Jack

Captain Jack Harkness witnessed the dematerialisation of the TARDIS on the southern face of Moel y Gest, a rocky hill in northern Wales. He felt that he needed the Doctor's help, especially in a crisis that he could not begin to comprehend.

Captain Jack is in command of Torchwood Three, the Welsh branch of the Torchwood Institute. Under his command was the technician Toshiko Sato (a daughter of Japanese immigrants), the team's medical officer Doctor Owen Harper, Jack's lover Ianto Jones, and his second-in-command Gwen Cooper. The team was sent to a village in North Wales to investigate sightings of a mysterious creature that resembled the Adar Llwch Gwin from ancient Welsh mythology.

"What the fuck is an Adar Llwch Gwin," Owen asked.

"Some bird-like monster," Ianto replied, "looks like a Griffin."

While interviewing a witness of the monster, Toshiko disappeared right in front of Ianto. She collapsed onto the floor below and complained of feeling ill. There was a look of terror-stricken on her face, and Owen thought that she looked as if she could vomit at any moment. To the horror of the team, Toshiko crumbled into dust. At the same time, Gwen and Owen both collapsed, and like Toshiko, they transformed into dust. Ianto and Jack glanced at each other in horror, trying to comprehend what they witnessed. They turned to find that their witness had run away in terror.

They walked out of the witness's home and turned to find panic-stricken villages, who had witnessed similar events happen to their friend and loved ones. The local authorities tried to maintain order and investigate, but some of the officers themselves had disappeared into dust. The two men ran away from the village, believing that some alien entity was responsible, but to Jack's horror, Ianto fell onto the grassy field. He looked as if he was ill, and he tried to reach for Jack, but he crumbled into dust, like everyone else in the village.

Jack desperately ran as fast as he could from the chaos in the village, sprinting for what felt like ten minutes or more. He collapsed out of exhaustion, and he felt he was done for. When Jack saw the TARDIS dematerialise, he found a sense of hope. His old friend, the Doctor, had returned, and hopefully, he can be here to help.

* * *

"Where are we Doctor," Vicki asked upon dematerialisation.

Steven was personally surprised that this wasn't a usual question Vicki would ask during their travels. The Doctor was busy at his controls, reviewing the scanner to determine if the outside environment was safe. The temperature outside was around nine degrees Celsius with a mild breeze, and it also appeared to be sometime during the autumn season. The atmosphere was breathable, and there were no deadly toxins detected by the TARDIS.

The image on the scanner depicted a field of trees in front of a mountain. It was raining heavily, and the Doctor implied that the fields were muddy landscapes. The Doctor theorised that the ship had landed in the Welsh mountain range of Snowdonia. He had visited this place during the reign of King Edward the Seventh when he was still with Susan, Ian, and Barbara.

"We're in Wales my dear," said the Doctor in response to Vicki's question.

"Where is Wales," asked Steven sarcastically and jokingly.

The Doctor, who was unable to interept Steven's cheeky tone, attempted to ignore his foolishness, but it was too frustratingly hard for him not to be astonished by the young man's supposed ignorance. The Doctor turned to Steven in disgust, and prepared to berate him.

"I was kidding," said Steven, "I was just provoking a reaction."

"I sure hope so dear boy," the Doctor responded, "ignorance such as that would be unacceptable! Goodness gracious young man, you're English, you should know what Wales is, yes indeed, you should!" Vicki chuckled as Steven left the console room for the living quarters in frustration.

* * *

With his remaining strength, Captain Jack Harkness began racing towards the TARDIS. Whatever was happening, he believed that he had very little time left. The world was in danger, and as far as he knew, more and more people were disappearing. Was this the experiment of a hostile alien empire hellbent on world domination? To Jack only the Doctor would know.

"Doctor," he cried. From the scanner, Steven saw Jack running towards the TARDIS like a madman.

"Doctor," he said, "someone's running towards us!"

The Doctor and Vicki walked over to the scanner and the entire trio found Captain Jack sprinting down the wet Welsh field toward the TARDIS. His face was panic-stricken, which in turn caused the trio to feel a state of unease.

"What's wrong with him Doctor," Steven asked.

"How the devil could I know," the Doctor retorted.

"We should help him," Vicki pleaded.

"We can't help, he looks mad," Steven snapped.

"Enough young ones," shouted the Doctor, "we'll be safe in here, he can't get us."

Steven began to breathe a sigh of relief while began to develop a sense of curiosity over the man who was running straight toward them. The Doctor went to the food machine to get a drink of water when a familiar sound began to play. The three of them could hear the winding and grinding of the TARDIS. The ship was dematerialising, and the Doctor was not even at the controls.

"How did you do that," Vicki demanded.

"I didn't my dear," the Doctor replied, "the ship is performing a self-dematerialisation. I don't know..."

Before the Doctor could finish, the ship began to quake violently. Vicki and Steven held on to each other while the Doctor grabbed hold of the console, calling for his companions to stay calm. Outside the TARDIS, Captain Jack Harkness grabbed the sides of the ship and held on for dear life. As the TARDIS was flying through the vortex, he keep crying for the Doctor.


End file.
